Scooby Doo, Where Are You?

Deserves to stand proudly alongside anything from the great mystery writers of any era – Chandler, Christie, Poe, Le Carre, Grisham, King, King Tut – throw them all in.

The ‘Doo’ has been gifted with an endearing innocence and a habit of putting his foot in his mouth that means he is frequently at odds with the adults in his world. With subtlety the authors show the disintegration of his once solid relationship with Shaggy through his eyes; Daphne is cold and controlling while Thelma chafes against her role as the non-glamorous intellectual. In the present day, Fred is living alone in a camper van and missing the fixed routines of the psychiatric hospital from which he has recently been released. He has no one to support his transition from institutional life and struggles to hold on to his job at a café in a large store.

Confounding childish logic, Scooby goes about drawing each of the human characters out of their comfort zone and back into the wider world, delivering to each an oasis of peace in a discordant world while at the same time solving the mystery of what is really going on in Spider Gates Cemetery after dark.

Most definitely at the vanguard of creative fiction, this is one story that doesn’t feel like its been churned out of a popular crime author sausage factory. Brilliant description and bobsled-fast twists and curves set amongst a runaway train plot, after this effort the authors deserve at the very least to have custom-made pastries made for them at their local bakery.